The invention is in the field of display stands for sheet material such as photographs, recipes, instructions, addresses, etc. An object is to provide a stand which is particularly inexpensive to manufacture and assemble but is sturdy and convenient to use. Stands of this general type are proposed, for example, in U.S. Pat. Nos. 1,711,070; 2,589,383; 2,945,594 and 3,218,743, but appear to be more expensive to make and to have less sturdy and convenient construction than is made possible by this invention.
An exemplary embodiment of the invention comprises a display stand having a base and a front and a back wall which slant toward each other in extending upwardly from the base and are integrally formed therewith from molded plastic material. Each wall has at its top edge a pair of spaced apart, open top notches aligned with those of the other wall. An open sleeve extends downwardly from each respective aligned pair of said notches and is located between said walls and secured thereto, preferably by being integrally molded therewith. The sheet material is held by a pair of ring members each made of integrally molded resilient plastic material and comprising an oval ring and a post which extends away from the ring along the short diameter thereof. Each ring is split at one side of its post, and each post is shaped and dimensioned to fit within its respective sleeve, with the connected end of each ring resting on its respective notch in the back wall and the free end of each ring resting on its respective notch in the front wall. Sheets such as photographs, transparent envelopes, or the like are loaded onto the display stand by pulling the rings apart until the free end of each clears the front wall, at which time the sheet or sheets having matching holes along a margin thereof are slid between the front wall and the free ring ends to align the holes with the free ring ends, and the rings are released to have the free ends thereof spring back and go through the sheet holes and come to rest on the notches in the front wall. The front and back walls can be connected to each other by side walls extending upwardly from the base and integrally formed together with the base and front and back walls. The top edges of the front and back walls can be covered by a snap lid of plastic material snap-locked to extensions of the side walls. Portions of the rings which are adjacent the post can be made substantially straight, or can have reduced curvature as compared to the remainder of the ring, to prevent excessive stagger in a stack of sheets loaded onto the stand. One or both of the posts and sleeves can have engaging means snap-locking them to each other as the posts are pushed down into the sleeves in assembling the stand.
In a particular embodiment the stand comprises only four parts which are easily assembled by hand: the unit made up of the base and front, back and side walls and sleeves, the two ring members, and the snap lid covering the top edges of the front and back walls. The stand is assembled by pushing the posts into the sleeves until they snap-lock to each other and snap-locking the snap lid at the top edges of the walls.